Launched in 2008, the Asian Cities Climate Change Resilience Network (ACCCRN) Initiative aimed tocatalyze attention, funding, and action for building the climate change resilience of vulnerable cities andpeople in Asia. Given that current estimates forecast that about 55 percent of Asia's population will beliving in urban centers by 2030, the ACCCRN Initiative is built on the premise that cities can take actionsto build climate resilience – including drainage and flood management, ecosystem strengthening,increasing awareness, and disease control – which can greatly improve the lives of poor and vulnerablepeople, not just in times of shock or stress, but every day.

At the time the initiative was launched, the concept of urban resilience and models for implementing itwere nascent and emergent. ACCCRN proved to be an important experiment and "learning lab" for theFoundation and its grantees and partners to build capacity in cities to better understand and implementresilience solutions to the often devastating shocks and stresses of climate change. The initiative waseffective in the initial 10 ACCCRN cities and, later, in an additional 40 cities.

As part of our Foundation-wide commitment to learning and accountability to our grantees, partnersand stakeholders, we undertook an independent evaluation of the work of the initiative in 2014 to assesswhat worked well and not so well in ACCCRN. Conducted by Verulam Associates and ITAD, who alsoconducted a mid-term evaluation of the ACCCRN Initiative in 2011, this summative evaluation highlightssuccesses, but also provides an important moment to reflect on the challenges we faced and on what wecan do better or differently going forward.